Detectives, Doctors, Shadows and Wings
by Cardboard Tube Knight
Summary: Post Series 2: While Molly helps Sherlock adjust to life in hiding, the Doctor abducts them and travels to an alternate universe and the year 1884 where he is certain there is something very wrong going on with time. Told from Molly's POV.
1. The Impossible Scuba Diver

**Chapter One: The Impossible Scuba Diver**

**Author's Note:** _This is an edit, the content is the same but there were some glaring mistakes in this and they needed to be fixed. So I replaced the document after my beta got done and replace it with this one. Hope you enjoy! _

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><p>From the moment the door opened on the tarmac in Bogotá, the heat had been siphoning the energy out of Molly Hooper. The climate, the culture, all of it was just far too different from London. She was spending a month in this? Molly hadn't ever had anything more Hispanic to eat than a corn crisp. She hadn't had ample time to prepare herself for this.<p>

The muggy air assaulted her and within minutes she felt all slick and sticky, her clothes clung to her body and she just wanted to be somewhere cold. Hopefully there was air conditioning where he was staying.

Molly didn't know any Spanish and she had to negotiate the cab. When she failed at miming the address she found someone who spoke Spanish. The man laughed at her.

"You seem to have found the only cab without an English-speaker driving," he said.

"Lucky me." She forced a laugh.

As the cab piloted her through the packed streets she had a chance to really look out the window and see the city. Every building was a shade of beige or tan or light grey or bright white. And there was something familiar in the city too, that strange mix of old world and new world blended together in an area where the technology and society grew up around what used to be little more than a trade center. (And wasn't that all a city was, a trade center?)

The place she was headed, the 'villa', it had been called, was at the edge of town from what the man at the airport had said. The roads were bumpy and jostled the cab along. The inside the vehicle smelled of stale cigarettes and coffee—oddly the smell reminded her of Sherlock.

_Awe bless, I hope he's okay. _

When the cab dropped her off and she paid the man the driver with the money Sherlock had sent her. The sky was golden as the sun set and she could smell something that thrilled her and made her stomach ache with hunger, it was like lime and grilled meat wafting through the air all around her.

Molly stopped at the door. She still couldn't believe how painfully obvious this was, even for him, who seemed to love to flaunt things. A smile washed over her face and she read the doors out loud.

"Building B, Villa #221," she said in a light voice.

Without her prompting or knocking the door opened and there he was standing framed in light and followed by a burst of cool air. He looked tanner, but with the same green eyes. In one of his hands was a spatula covered in grease. His eyes scanned Molly. She had always felt like she was being psychically invaded when he looked at her like that. Like she was under an alien probe of some kind and her whole body was blocked from responding to her mind. Her mouth fell open slightly and, as if to call her back out of a dream state, he said her name. "Molly."

In some sense Sherlock Holmes was a ghost. In just the few days since she had seen him he had quit shaving and looked more rugged already. His skin was taking on an olive tone, surprisingly he hadn't just burned. He wore a white smock and black pants that made him look more like an extra on _Merlin_ than the great detective.

"Sherlock, how are you holding up?" she asked.

"Fine," he was lying. She knew it and before she could call him out, he corrected it. "I'm bored and the heat has me feeling somewhat ill, I crave the comforts of home. But I've come to terms with that already," he said.

Molly nodded.

"I can tell you're bored. You seemed excited to see me," she joked.

Sherlock laughed and she could tell by the quality of it that he hadn't laughed in days. Molly found it hard to laugh in the week since his faked death. Everyone around her had changed and she was forced to hide or lie.

"You have your own room which provides ample privacy and some space to do any recreational activities you might want—"

Molly cut him off. "Thank God," she muttered.

The room was sparsely furnished with rustic looking pieces of furniture and there were slow moving fans everywhere to promote airflow. The arrangement reminded Molly of a vacation home she had stayed in with her family in Morocco one time. That was the first time she had been this hot and she didn't like it then either. Being this sweaty near Sherlock didn't help matters. She'd worn white and knowing him he'd already seen through her shirt.

"I just need you to help me set up for the long-term; I don't know how long I will have to live like this."

"I've brought you what I could without suspicion, but I had to avoid John and Mrs. Hudson. The look in their eyes just kills me."

"They'll be better for it. If I hadn't done this, they would have _actually_ been killed," Sherlock says.

Molly felt a tinge of sympathy as she glanced at him, but it welled into something bolder.

"And you don't see how you're the hero. Look what you did to save your friends? Character assassination, making yourself to look like a fraud when all of the science you've ever uttered, every clue I've ever read in that blog or heard you talk about out loud either instantly made sense to me or did when I looked it up later. You're perfect," Molly said it all in one breath and only realized what she had said after. "I'm sorry," she added.

"Thank you," he said. "I do need to remain hiding and it's also to keep you safe. You're part of it now."

"I said I'd do anything for you and I meant it," Molly said. "But why did it have to be me?"

"Because he wouldn't consider you, he wouldn't even think of you. He underestimated you all of the time and I admit I abused you to some degree…" Molly didn't like apologetic Sherlock. Somehow, she liked it better when he was rude to her.

"Yeah, well I dumped him," she said. They both laughed and Molly leaned against the wall where one of the fans was aimed directly at her. "Shit, I'm going to have to get some shorter skirts." It wasn't something she meant to say it had just slipped out and it made Sherlock laugh harder. He had just wanted the company.

Suddenly the room exploded and there was a tumultuous sound mixed with some whirring noise. Glass and plaster rained down around them and Molly was pushed to the floor and held there by Sherlock. She squealed in fear, the sound muffled by floor and she could hear Sherlock shouting to her.

"Quiet, stay down! Stay down!"

She felt him move for something heavy and metallic pressed between them, she realized very quickly what it was.

Sherlock came up from the floor, holding her down with one hand and peered around the room. She could only peek up at him by turning her head sideways and he was indeed holding a gun aimed at someone. As he moved out of reach she rolled onto her side to see the thing that had caused the ruckus and it didn't look at all like a bomb or weapon.

Atop the mound of debris there was an unscratched blue box leaning back at an angle. Dust clouded the air and light poured through the hole perfectly illuminating the box in a majestic, almost intentional way.

Molly coughed as she struggled to get to her feet.

"A police box?" she asked.

Sherlock scrutinized the object. "A 1960s era Police Box, more than likely from London—to be precise."

"Fifty years out of service and eight thousand five hundred kilometers from where it should be…" Molly said.

The door was knocked open by a hefty object slamming into it and something fired out with a long cord attached. When Molly glanced up she could see that it was a harpoon that had buried itself in the ceiling. From deep within the blue box someone towed themselves out, as if they were rock climbing. Though the box couldn't be much bigger than a phone booth this person was making it a huge ordeal. Golden light was pouring out of the box making the whole matter that much more dramatic and to top it all off the person was wearing a diving suit with the old-style brass helmet.

Something far stranger than she could ever profess to having come across was going on here.

The person worked their helmet off to reveal an odd looking man with his hair mussed up at the front. He stared at Sherlock, who was still holding the gun and then looked to Molly.

"Sorry about the ceiling," he said. "Getting here is a bit more trouble than I would have thought and I had to make a few minor modifications…" the man trailed off.

"What are you?" Sherlock said, moving the gun slightly to reassert the point that he had it. The word 'what' seemed an odd choice because Molly was sure it was intentional. Sherlock did everything intentionally.

"The Doctor."

"Doctor who?"

The man smiled.

"Isn't that the question of the millennia," he said in a low slow voice with a rich quality that made him seem much too old and wise to be in that body. "The Doctor. They just call me the Doctor. And you're Sherlock Holmes, the great detective of Baker Street."

"You know a lot for a man who crashed through the wall in a big blue box," Sherlock said.

The Doctor smiled.

"This is more than a box, you're going to want to put that gun down and step inside of _this _box."

"What's in there?"

"The world and more, more than you could ever deduce," the Doctor said.

Molly could tell by looking that Sherlock was running over a list of ideas in his head. He was doing that Mind Castle thing or whatever it was called. She had seen it on more than one occasion and the results had been somewhat startling. As she and the Doctor looked on he moved his hands about in the air as if he were flicking through an imaginary touch screen connected to his brain to find the information that he needed.

The only thought that Molly could come up with was a Trojan horse.

"I've considered all of the possibilities," Sherlock said finally and keeping the gun trained on the Doctor he nears the opening of the box and peered down inside the doors. His face bathed in golden light, Molly sees something that she's never seen from Sherlock before. He's utterly stumped. Not even in a matter of that he can't figure it out, but as if he's seen the impossible.

She nears the box and glances down inside to see why.

Not the whole world, but a much bigger world than the one on the outside. The inside of the box was an entire room bigger than the villa and yet somehow it was only as small as a phone booth. She grabbed the edge of the box and held on, her knees going wobbly.

"Something is wrong with time, well, with your time. In the world I come from you're a thing of the past, a detective written about in great stories by a man who practically invented the modern crime novel—but there's been an error somewhere, something I'm missing and you're at the center of it …" The Doctor walked up to stand atop the box in the course of his speech and then made his way down to stand before them in a theatrical fashion.

Time? My world? It was too much and that sent Molly spiraling down into that hole. She slumped against the blue box and everything went dark.

* * *

><p>When Molly blinked awake she was in that world inside of the blue box and everything was painted a dream-shade of yellow. The lights were all too bright and she laid still as her body tried to reorient itself. She was still a little dizzy but could see that she was surrounded by random things. There was a car seat bolted down, the petrol reservoir off of a weed-whacker hung from a huge center console that was topped off by something that seemed to be a blown glass display. The floor was a glass platform and the walls made it appear she was inside of a giant, well-lit honey comb.<p>

Sherlock was talking to someone in the background and at first she could only tell by the quality of the voices, that silky, sexy, sarcastic tone Sherlock spoke with and the other person like grown child, excited to be speaking about whatever it was they were saying, yet knowledgeable none the less. Slowly the words became audible and she fully understood her first half a sentence.

"…which is why we've got to cross back over the void and get you to 1884," said the other man—Molly remembered him as the Doctor now. He walked into view holding what looked like some sort of alien torch in his hands.

Sherlock sighed.

"This box that's bigger on the inside is a scientific possibility so I can accept that you can bend space to look smaller than it is on the inside while still managing to occupy more space and have anything that enters that space retain its properties," Sherlock said. "But time travel is scientific impossibility," he said.

"Course it is, for your people-brains," the Doctor said.

_Did he seriously just talk to Sherlock like that?_

There was tension in the air and Molly went to sit up, she could tell that Sherlock was going to speak. But just before he did the Doctor put his fingers to his lips and shushed him. Sherlock, as if compelled, froze looking utterly cross. The Doctor threw his arms out wide with joy as he saw Molly stirring.

"There she is, see I knew she'd be okay. Not the first person to faint when faced with the inside of the TARDIS," said the Doctor.

"The what?" Molly pressed her hand to her forehead. The lights still hurt and she had to squint just to see anything.

"Ah the lights, sorry about that bit," the Doctor clapped his hands twice quickly and two thirds of the lights that were set into the wall cut out leaving the room with a sort of eerie teal glow that wafted up from the floor. Molly had to admit that it felt much better on her head.

"If you're good enough to walk, Molly, I think we should be going. This man, no matter how alien or intelligent is mad," Sherlock said as he crossed the room.

"Yes, I'm a mad man with a box, a time traveling box," the Doctor said leaning forward as if he were telling them a secret. "And if you're pretending to be dead, if you're hiding from the likes of James Moriarty's men then you simply have got no better choice than the past. I mean what have you really got to lose?"

"My dignity," Sherlock turned to ask Molly who was staring at the walls.

"But you don't care about that, you let a man drag your name through the mud without a fight just to save your friends—which is why I'm trying to help you in both worlds—because we're a lot alike." All the while the Doctor was smiling, his voice seemed to take on a prodding tone, Molly wanted to laugh.

"Am I this arrogant?" asked Sherlock.

_Always. _Molly thought.

"We'd both do anything to save those close to us and we both _died _to protect them," the Doctor said.

The room was perfectly silent except for the distant hum of the machines around them and Molly wondered what Sherlock had to say for this. He was expressionless and his eyes were locked with the Doctor. Seeing them both like this they seemed somewhat opposite of one another, Sherlock's hard chiseled features and the Doctor's more droopy, elongated face.

Molly was still trying to get her wits about her but she managed to utter the words that broke a long silence.

"You're on the run too?" she said trying to concentrate on the blurry form that was the Doctor. Things kept going in and out of focus.

"I've been running for a long time. Too long. Even when I stand my ground it just leads to more running…" he said as he braced himself against the center console. When her vision came back into focus he looked so much older with the grim expression his face had taken, the way his eyes had sunken into the shadows of the dimly lit room as he moved.

She thought of Sherlock when he had come to her in the lab. Was she about to regret helping him?

_Never._

"If you don't mind me asking Doctor," Molly stammered. "What are you really?"

"Just an old fool. An alien is the answer you're looking for—A Time Lord," he said. His coat was off and he wore bracers over mauve shirt that seemed to glow in the green light of the room.

Molly didn't know what she had expected him to say, she looked to Sherlock who made no protest and she knew somehow he was thinking the same thing—this man really wasn't from this world. This technology was impossible.

"Mister Holmes, tell me, if you could go anywhere in all the universe in an instant, where would you go?" asked the Doctor as a sly smile came over his face. He pulled a lever and worked a slider down a zig-zag path on the console.

An earthquake began, or what Molly imagined to be an earthquake. She was nearly thrown from where she was sitting and Sherlock had to grab hold of the railing around the platform they were on. When she looked up the Doctor was darting around the console, somehow keeping his balance and flicking at different switches, pumping mundane objects that seemed to do absolutely nothing and checking screens.

Sparks rained down from the center of the huge glass structure in the middle of the room as a whirring sound filled the air. Molly let out a shriek and crumpled to the floor, covering her head. The room rocked, bucked and shook and she could hear the Doctor yelling over the melee.

"Excuse the ride, crossing the void has its complications and I had to modify some things on the fly!"

The shaking became more violent and there was a thunderous crackle, the kind that Molly had seen when she went to air shows with her father and the planes broke the sound barrier. Then the movement became less pronounced to the point that it was just a gentle listing back and forth. She looked up and the Doctor was darting down the ramp that led to the door.

With a violent kick he knocked the door open and grabbed hold of the wall just before he slipped out.

"Geronimo!" the Doctor yelled dangling from the open door. When Molly saw outside she almost fainted again.

"A city…"

"London," Sherlock said. Though it couldn't be the London they knew, it was the London of old perhaps. They were flying through the sky hundreds of feet above London. How was a box _flying?_

"We haven't fallen out yet and that means the gravity is at least working…" the Doctor commented. But they were nearing the ground at an alarming speed and the Doctor turned, pulled that strange torch from his coat and aimed it at the center console. The end of it glowed green and one of the levers reacted.

The movement stopped, presumably they had landed somewhere. The Doctor slipped the torch back into his pocket and opened the door.

"Here we are." He held it so that they could get out, but Molly needed to be outside in a rush.

She sprinted out the door dizzily, pushing past Sherlock and the Doctor and ran into the room where they had landed. Instinct took over and she went for the bathroom where she vomited in the toilet. It seemed the motion had caught up to her and she hadn't even realized how she knew where the restroom was.

"Sherlock's flat?"

Sherlock stepped into the room behind her and handed her a clean towel that he must have found or been given by the Doctor. "Same place, in a different time," he said before he pointed out the window that was still visible from the door. Sherlock stood beside the window with muted shock as Molly washed her face and walked over to peer out into the street.

"London, in November 1884," the Doctor said as he stepped into view. "Are you okay, Molly?"

She blushed, though she wasn't sure why he had that effect on her. Maybe because he was saying her name and she didn't even know his.

"I'll manage, it's just the motion…"

Sherlock was staring out the window, the reflection of his face playing back for Molly the plethora of emotions that crossed his face. He turned back to the box, muttering something to himself as he examined it with a slide out magnifier.

"Shared hallucination, seeing what we expect to see. I've dealt with something like this before, Doctor," Sherlock ran his fingers along the hull of the box and looked them over when they came away.

"Even I'm not that clever," the Doctor said.

"This is some clever trick," Sherlock concluded. "Designed to make us see where we wanted to be," he said.

Molly shook her head. "That doesn't make sense, I see all of this too and—" Molly stopped herself. She was where she had wanted to be in Bogotá, with Sherlock. Sure it had only been for his convenience, but it was the truth. "Why would I have wanted to be at Baker's Street?" she said finally.

A stack of newspapers filled one corner and Sherlock walked over to them, he snatched the first one up and scanned it. The room looked much the same as Molly remembered it. The last time she had seen it was a few months after Christmas when she came by to drop something off, John had called her though she knew it was for Sherlock. The wallpaper looked to be brand new, but the same pattern. The furniture was completely different as was its placement.

She ran her hand over the fabric of the couch as she edged toward the window. The city's shape was the same. It was London. But Victorian London, the way she had always pictured it when she read about it as a child.

"I over think these things. If the simplest explanation is the best, then there must be something else besides time travel to substantiate what's happened here," Sherlock muttered. "Drugged again…we could have been drugged when the box crashed into the villa—that would explain why were able to see a huge world inside of the police box and why we're seeing all of this now.' His words sounded rushed on the last part, like he was part of the way into a panic.

"But the Doctor wasn't wearing any sort of breathing apparatus, so it couldn't have been like the case John wrote about—as much as it might be crazy to admit, I think this might be the truth," Molly said, she didn't know how she was taking this so well. How was she being the calm one?

"November of 1884, what day is it?" Sherlock said.

"The sixth," the Doctor said as he ran his fingers over the blue box.

"Four days ago Timișoara became the first place in Europe with streets lit by electric light," Sherlock commented.

"The lamps outside look like gas, they're beautiful," Molly said.

The sun was still out and there were people here and there on the streets. A light rain was falling over the city and there was something magical and lush about the whole scene. Molly was always a bit too much of a romantic, but she refrained from mentioning any of her thoughts to Sherlock.

He stepped closer to the window, his shoulder almost touching hers and she could still smell the grilled meat and lime. The aroma's of the villa and Bogotá were still fresh on him, yet they were standing an ocean away and one hundred twenty-eight years in the past. A horse drawn cab trotted to a stop on the cobblestone street in front of the flat. Someone with a parasol climbed out of the carriage, their person hidden from view.

Straightening his bow tie, the Doctor stepped in behind them and wrapped his arms around their shoulders.

"So Amy and Rory, where to first?"

"Who?" Molly glanced at him.

"Sorry—force of habit," he apologized.

Molly smiled warily and glanced down at her clothes. She pulled away from the Doctor and tugged at her skirt. "I certainly can't go out like this—I'm going to need clothes," she said. "Real Victorian clothes. I guess it won't get too much different for you two."

"Hello? Is somebody there?" came a familiar voice from the stairwell.

"Mrs. Hudson?" Sherlock mouthed the words, Molly had to wonder if she had actually heard them.

"Oh Doctor, it's you—dear, you all frightened me. And you've brought up some—kind of strange wardrobe up," the woman who stepped into view was the spitting image of Mrs. Hudson right down to the voice. She was examining the blue box.

The Doctor grabbed her by the shoulders and kissed her on either cheek.

"How lovely to see you again, Mrs. Hudson," he said.

"Was this the niece you told me about—the one that would be moving in?" Mrs. Hudson asked.

"Yes, this is Molly and her husband Sherlock Holmes. They've been looking for a place here in the city," said the Doctor said.

Mrs. Hudson smiled.

"Oh newlyweds, you must be so proud." Those words sent Molly reeling, she felt faint all over again. The Doctor reached into his pocket and his arm seemed to go too far and he pulled out a huge wad of strange paper money tied with twine.

"This should cover the first month's rent plus utilities," he said. "Not sure how much it is…"

Mrs. Hudson's eyes went wide.

"Oh, this shall do nicely for far longer than a month!" she said. Sherlock couldn't take his eyes off Mrs. Hudson, everything about her was exactly the same as the Mrs. Hudson they both knew. "You look like you've been traveling a while. Would you like a cup of tea?"

"Possibly, I shall be taking Molly to purchase some clothes—they're recently back from India and she's become taken with their strange fashions," the Doctor said. "Could you stay here, Sherlock and just finalize things with Mrs. Hudson?" he asked.

Sherlock nodded. He seemed to have no objection to Molly pretending to be his wife. Of course people would be much less likely to rent to two unmarried people trying to move in together.

The Doctor wrapped his arm around Molly and led her out of the flat and down to the stairs that led out to the street.

"You might be here a while, so you need to look the part," the Doctor said. "I even took the liberty of picking up your cat Toby—friendly fellow, had nothing but good things to say about you…"


	2. The Girl Who Died

**The Girl Who Died**

**Author's Note:** _Sorry for the tardiness_.

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><p>Molly dragged the Doctor from shop to shop until their arms were full of Victorian clothes. He was the first man to ever actually take her on a shopping trip, though he was having as much fun as her from what she could tell. He modeled any silly hat he found in front of her, strutting back and forth with them on to show off. Later she was forced to pull him out of a store to keep from buying one of the horrible things. Though he was adamant about purchasing a pin striped bowtie, Molly didn't mind it. He was good company.<p>

It was drizzling as they walked down the high street lined on either side by all kinds of shops and vendors. A young boy in tattered clothes was halfway up the block holding a pail with lush flowers in it. As they passed the boy Molly couldn't help herself and stooped down to offer the boy two treasury notes.

"I'd like some," she said forcing her kindest smile.

The boy's face lit up as he ripped a square of butcher paper off of a roll and wrapped them. He handed them to her and she cradled them in her arm. The Doctor had offered to carry the clothes for her, with the exception of the Mackintosh raincoat she'd purchased and her dress and corset. She wore those from the store. (There was no point wandering the streets dressed like a heathen anymore)

"Thank you ma'am," the boy said.

"You're welcome." Molly kissed him on the cheek and he grabbed his face, his smile growing even wider.

The Doctor and Molly continued on without a carriage, despite the fact that it was raining. The sky over London was a fluffy grey and everything looked so beautiful when it was cobblestone and wood and brass. The city that Molly had lived in most of her life took on a new sort of magic.

"If you really want to surprise Sherlock we could get your hair curled into little ringlets," the Doctor said. "It's supposed to be—what do you call it? Sexy."

"Nothing about me is sexy."

"Nonsense," the Doctor said putting his hand on her shoulder. "There's a little sexy in anyone, even my TARDIS has a little in her and she's over a thousand years old…"

"TARDIS," Molly had to change the subject. "You said that word before, it's that blue box thing, isn't it?"

The Doctor nodded. "Time and relative dimension in space. It's not a box, it's a living organism that travels through time and space."

"Why does it look like a Police Box?"

"The TARDIS is one of the most amazing pieces of technology you'll ever lay your pretty brown eyes on," the Doctor pointed at her eyes with two fingers. "Every time it materializes in a new location, within the first nanosecond of landing, it analyzes its surroundings, calculates a 12th dimensional data map of everything within a thousand mile radius and determines which outer shell would blend in best to the environment—and then it disguises itself as a police telephone box from 1963."

"Is it broken?" asked Molly.

"I think I've said all of that before," the Doctor said with his hand to his chin as they walked along. He turned quickly to glare at Molly. "No it's not broken, it's just a little attached to that form."

"I see," Molly couldn't help but laugh at how offended he was by the comment.

They walked further in silence, passing into an area of London that was less developed and seemed to be older. An ancient looking stone church marked one corner and the rest of the block that it occupied was a huge under kept graveyard. A black wrought iron fence blocked the graveyard off from the rest of the world, the only way in that Molly could see beside the church was a stone archway.

The Doctor came to a stop alongside the archway and turned back to face her, his hands still occupied with the clothes.

"There was something I did need to show you," the Doctor said as he led her into the graveyard. "The real reason I brought you out."

Molly couldn't remember many stories where the strange man led the pretty (not) girl into a graveyard and everything went well. This one was particularly unnerving because the grassy had grown up to and unhealthy height in the more narrow aisles and it was hard to see from one to another. Still she walked deeper into the cemetery with him and they passed between two huge oak trees that must have been two hundred years old.

They turned down one of the aisles and Molly trudged along, her feet catching on the high grass. She reached up to push the hair out of her face, clutching the flowers to her breast. The Doctor stopped by a huge headstone with a miniature British flag carved into the stone above the name. And when Molly spotted the name she gasped, almost dropping her bouquet occupying her arms.

_HERE LIES MAJOR_  
><em>JOHN H. WATSON M.D.<em>  
><em>1855-1880<em>

"John's dead? What—"

The Doctor cut her off. "He died in the _Battle of Maiwand_, the end of the _Second Anglo-Afghan War_…"

Molly shook her head. "John, our John, fought in the Afghanistan war and came back alive. But this. We can't let Sherlock know, even this isn't his John."

"Are you certain it's for the best?"

"What do you think?"

"It's your choice. You have to make the decision, Molly."

"Why? And why would you bring me here?"

"Because," the Doctor pushed through the grass guarding their aisle and into the next. He stepped up onto a headstone and over it. Molly followed him three more rows over and further up the aisle they reached. "Because I need you to understand that time is a complex thing," he said as he stopped in front of a moss covered headstone that was small and faded grey.

_IN LOVING MEMORY_  
><em>OF<em>  
><em>MOLLY HOOPER<em>  
><em>WIFE AND MOTHER<em>  
><em>1851-1882<em>

"I was a mother?"

"You died giving birth to your second child, a little girl named Victoria—everyone is named Victoria now, though I can't sort why. The point is I don't know what makes time and dimensions the way they are. The universe is a big place and sometimes there's miracles, sometimes people larger than life exist in a world that's too small-minded to appreciate them."

Molly couldn't take her eyes off of the grave.

"Is Sherlock, is there a Sherlock here?"

"Sherlock here is a piece of fiction."

"He's too big for our world to appreciate him. They tried to shun him for his brilliance," Molly said.

"He does need people to care for him."

"I doubt he wants my care, even now I'm just convenience."

"You need to learn—you have to understand in time. It's imperative you do, because there may come a time when you have to save him and no one but you will be able to do it," the Doctor said.

Molly ignored him. "It's a good thing I bought flowers. How often is it you get to place them on your own grave?" She dropped a single flower onto the grave of this world's Molly Hooper.

"Are you going to be okay?" asked the Doctor.

Molly nodded. "Can I have a moment to visit John's grave alone?" she asked.

With a solemn nod and a pat on the back the Doctor strolled off down the aisle and left her alone. Molly moved between the rows of graves back to where Watson's lay. It was hard to believe that he had existed here in such a different time. And she wondered what he looked like, was he even the same man? Maybe he had a mustache? Or glasses? Maybe it was him that wore a ridiculous hat and not Sherlock.

"I'll take care of him, John," she didn't mean to say it but it just came out. "I'll watch out for Sherlock because more than being in love with him I just—love him. He's a good man underneath it all and he needs good people around him. And you're not here and Mrs. Hudson's a stranger, so that just leaves me and until he's back in 2012. I'll be his protector."

Molly stooped down, the corset squeezing her insides tight, and placed the bundle of flowers right in front of the headstone. A slight grimace overcame her face and she kissed her fingers and pressed them to the engraved name.

"I'm so stupid—it's just, sorry—now I'm apologizing to the dead, not that it's the first time. Judging by what I just found out though, I'm a dead girl me-self."

She let out a short laugh as she wrapped the remainder of the flowers tighter in the paper.

"Suppose I'm pretty spry for a corpse."

A sound like stone sliding against stone made her glance up. Molly looked down the aisle and there was no one there. She walked further along to stand next to a huge ornate statue that she didn't remember seeing. Her fingers traced a line over the sandaled feet.

_Such detail_.

Molly gazed at the thing's height. It wasn't marking a grave, just guarding this area in a metaphorical sense, she guessed. The statue was of a life-sized angel with huge, billowing wings unfurled behind it and a robe. Its face was covered by its hands, as if it were weeping.

_Duh, Molly. This is a graveyard. _

"Doctor? Are you around here?"

She headed toward the end of the aisle, hoping that the Doctor had chosen to wait for her by the entrance.

"Doctor?"

As she neared the end of the row Molly chanced one last glance back to see something peculiar. When she had been closer to the statue she could have sworn that the hands completely covered the eyes. Now the fingers stopped at the top of the cheek and two hollow, lifeless eyes stared toward her. An involuntary shiver shook Molly's body and she couldn't look into that stone gaze anymore. Without another thought about it she turned to find the Doctor.

_Must have just been the angle. _


	3. Surprise

**Surprise**

**Author's Note:** _This has taken me a bit longer than it should have and for that I am sorry.I wanted to make sure that I had something substantial to put here though and that it was something worth the time to read it. This chapter is another long one, but I kind of let the chapters decide where they should end._**  
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* * *

><p>When Molly asked the Doctor what the date was and he drew up the sleeve of his jacket and checked the watch that faced the wrong way on his arm, she already knew. Even if they had traveled through time, she couldn't let tomorrow pass by without doing <em>something<em>.

By the time that they made the other stops that Molly requested of the Doctor, it was dusk and the drizzle had grown into a deluge. They climbed the darkened stairwell up to 221B and turned the corner to find Sherlock scrunched up on the couch wearing his night clothes and reading a newspaper. Molly looked his clothing over and recognized it as the set she'd brought him from England.

_So our luggage is here?_

The Doctor deposited the clothes they'd purchased out on a vacant couch across the room from Sherlock. Molly couldn't see his face and he didn't look toward her. She came and laid the remainder of the flowers down on the table beside him. "I bought these for you—to pretty the place up."

"Why did you go out?" His eyes never left the paper.

"Certainly couldn't let the poor girl go out like she was dressed," the Doctor said.

"I want Molly to answer," Sherlock said and Molly knew the tone. He suspected something and he wasn't making it a secret.

"Just—just getting clothes."

Sherlock folded the paper and bounded to his feet. "If there's one thing I can be sure about when it pertains to you, Doctor, it's that you lie. You're lying about the clothes and you're attempting to make Molly lie. And we all know she isn't capable of that." There was cruelty in his eyes that she was all too familiar with.

"The only reason she could know what happened to me is because no one's going to bother to ask her or care what she thinks or knows," Sherlock added.

He was doing it again. Being horrible and Molly felt the openness that she had experienced around him hours ago start to ebb away.

"Why do you always do this?" the words were barely audible.

Sherlock eyed her and turned toward the Doctor. "The excuse of going to buy clothes might have worked if I thought that you cared about adhering to this period's norms, Doctor. Your watch, worn on the wrist a style not popular until the 1920s, it also houses a digital numbering under the face. Your clothes, completely next century—though they'd probably be better suited for a mathematics teacher…"

It seemed he might have stopped here, but when Sherlock was on a roll it wasn't like he could just let something go.

"Socks—containing polyester, which is a material not invented until 1941 and the aglet on your shoelace is plastic. Then there's the fact that when we were in the TARDIS before Molly awakened I had time to look around. One of the rooms adjacent to the one we were in is a huge wardrobe with more than enough period clothing to suit Molly's needs." Sherlock finished.

_John's grave? Would he somehow know about that too?_

Molly knew that if anything would make Sherlock sour it was hearing that, so she told him the next best thing. It was the truth anyway.

"Why are you doing it—it was just innocent—if you have to know the Doctor was showing me my grave! There are you satisfied!" Molly was screaming at Sherlock, even he couldn't believe it judging by the look on his face.

The room was still for a moment and then Molly sighed. "I'm—I'm sorry."

"What do you mean you were looking at your grave?"

"The Molly Hooper from this time died in childbirth, it's the reason why she's safe to have here because there's literally no chance of her creating paradoxes by messing with her other self, not that she should be able to create them considering that she's not from this universe, similar Mollies, but different enough that there shouldn't be any issues. Still it's safer to only have one Molly in one time," the Doctor said rambling on.

"Would that mean there was a Sherlock in this world?"

Molly shook her head. "And no John Watson either—some people just don't exist in a certain universe. My guess is that the only Holmes and Watson this world knew were in stories…"

She knew it was a lie, but what else could she do? She didn't want him worried and it was just for his own good. Plus it made sense, the book them was the real them here.

"Speaking of which…" the Doctor reached into his jacket and fished out a book that was much too large to fit, "this is all about you," he said.

The book in his hand was thick and bound with green leather. _The Essential Adventures of Sherlock Holmes_. There was a smaller line of text below that: _As told by his biographer, John Watson._

Sherlock snatched the book down and flipped through it and Molly had to admit she was curious too. She sidled up next to him as he stopped on a header in the middle of the book.

_The Final Problem_

"That's what Moriarty called it on the roof that day," Sherlock said.

"Do you think it could be about what happened?" Molly asked.

The Doctor grabbed the books from their palms and it vanished into the jacket. "Spoilers," the Doctor chided them. "I'm going to have to leave you here for a while, you'll be safe for the most part if you stick to the flat and don't attempt to alter history. Don't talk to anyone who looks important and don't get photographed…"

"Wait where are you going?"

"Time's still broken and there's something here that shouldn't be, if things get out of control I've got to put a little failsafe in place."

Sherlock was still upset about something, Molly just felt it. But she didn't know what it could be. He seemed mad when they came in and she wondered it had to do with something that happened before that. What had he been doing?

_The newspaper…_

"How can we be sure you'll return?"

"Because leaving us in this time would be more dangerous than taking us home, we could do irrefutable damage to the future. Imagine if my general knowledge of the past were applied to make us billionaires? Or what if you went down to Bart's and synthesized a bunch of medicines and created Hooper Pharmaceuticals…."

"What he said," The Doctor clapped his hands together as he headed back to the TARDIS. "Plus I always come back."

He paused, dipping his hand into that seemingly bottomless pocket and pulled out a white sack. "Before I go, have some more money," the Doctor stacked the money into Molly's hands. The Doctor slipped into the TARDIS and shut the door. He was in there for a few moments and then he returned with a suitcase in one hand and Toby clutched in the other.

The Doctor dropped the suitcase a Molly's feet and held Toby up as if he was going to hand him back to her. At the last moment he pulled the cat back and gazed into those alert feline eyes as if to communicate an emotion only known to cats. Then his face softened. "You look after them Toby," he said.

_Meow_

"Now Molly needs you, I know she thinks she's in charge. That's the problem with humans."

He handed Toby off to Molly and then kissed her on either cheek. Then he moved to grab Sherlock's hand and shook it vigorously. Something about the goodbye felt so final it scared Molly, but she trusted the Doctor. She didn't even know why. But she did.

As he stride back into the blue police box, his TARDIS, she waved and embarrassingly enough she felt her eyes begin to tear up. Seconds later the TARDIS begin to fade from sight as the engines filled the room with a dull whirring noise. When it had completely vanished there was no sign that it had ever been real. Molly could have been a crazy woman living in Victorian London, dreaming about fantastic Doctors and a future that never would be.

* * *

><p>Molly almost forgot about how angry Sherlock had been over the course of the night because she still had so much work to do before tomorrow. She couldn't be bothered with the kitchen in their flat, she would have to go up to Mrs. Hudson's. Luckily she was more like their Mrs. Hudson than Molly would have first guessed. The matron of the property was all too happy to help Molly with the baking.<p>

When the oven was finally shut and Mrs. Hudson had gone to clean the utensils, Molly pushed in next to her at the wash bins. "I've got it Mrs. Hudson."

"Nonsense, dear, I've got this. You've got to be well rested."

"You wouldn't believe it but I'm pretty used to the long nights—I worked long nights plenty of times next to Sher—" Molly caught herself.

Mrs. Hudson smiled and Molly knew she didn't suspect anything out of the ordinary. "That husband of yours is a lucky man. I guess a woman's got to take care of a good man like him though," she said. "He's going to be so pleased with all of this work you're doing."

Molly splashed water up out of the washtub to get the flower off of her arms. She smiled nervously and averted her eyes. "I hope he will—Sherlock's had it hard. Not to mention I'm not much of a wife." Molly was only saying what Sherlock would have thought. She wondered if an like him could ever really be married.

"Come now," Mrs. Hudson said grasping her at the shoulder. "Tell me what you got him for his special day?"

A red warmth crept up Molly's cheeks and she couldn't contain the sly smile that slipped over her face. "The Doc—my uncle found out that the great violinist Ole Bull is here in town tonight with some other musicians. I'm not that familiar with all of it but Sherlock plays and I just know he'll—he might enjoy it."

Mrs. Hudson stepped around to Molly's side and pressed one hand to Molly's stomach and the other to her upper back. She pulled Molly upright until her posture was straight. "A woman has to be confident; he wouldn't have married you if he didn't enjoy you, dear."

_In a perfect world…_

"I know, Mrs. Hudson. I just get nervous. Thank you for the help with the cake and everything," Molly yawned.

"Go and get some rest, dear. You've got to be wide awake for Sherlock's birthday. I'll tend to the cake."

"Thank you," Molly said before slipping back to their flat. Sherlock was on the couch still, reading over a book that he had found in the storage at the base of the stairs. Molly strolled half way past him before he acknowledged her.

"Molly, if we're to keep appearances up it might be necessary for us to share the bedroom. Our Mrs. Hudson would notice and we don't want this one to…"

"I understand," Molly said. She wondered sometimes if he really understood what he did to her. She wondered if he understood a lot of the reactions others had to him. He was so candid with his responses, it was like he was thinking so much all of the time and yet words came out of him without a filter, like he had never thought about them at all.

Then as if he had read her thoughts or been saving it for dramatic effect, Sherlock continued. "I'll take the floor of course, and you'll still have your privacy," he said.

Molly nodded. "Thank you—Sherlock," she rushed into the bedroom and shut the door behind herself.

* * *

><p>There had been cake and they sang Happy Birthday. After that they headed out to the concert where they saw Ole Bull, Clara and Robert Schumann, Felix Mendelssohn and Franz Liszt—it was simply beautiful and somehow the spirit of time just engulfed Molly and she thought for just a brief time that she belonged here in this world.<p>

Had the Doctor planned this?

He had left them only hours before, during the night, yet it felt like she hadn't ever belonged more in a place than she did here. Sherlock didn't seem to be out of place either, though he refused to dress in an appropriate manner for the times. He wore his usual coat and scarf, though he had carried a cane.

_It was the only way to attend such an event_, he had chided her. Though this chiding sounded much more friendly and jovial.

When they sang to him he had been in good spirits. It was hard to find him being rude around Mrs. Hudson, he kept himself pleasant for her most of the time. But even after they left the house he was still treating Molly with more respect than she thought he ever had for this long a time. She kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and for him to say the wrong thing or ignore her.

They walked home in a light snow, it was all too romantic and Molly felt like if this had been a movie or TV show this would have been the time when the handsome, but cold seemingly lead kissed the plucky, yet shy heroine. But that wasn't how Sherlock operated.

Sherlock grasped her at the shoulder, his grip felt too strong through the coat. For a split second it was like he was touching her bare skin. She turned to face him and he was pointing up at something across the street. "Well look where we are," he said.

"Saint Bart's," Molly looked up at the building looming in the darkness, somewhat frightened by how similar it looked in another universe and a hundred and twenty seven years earlier. She smiled and turned to point, the snow caught in the tendrils of hair around her face. "One hundred and eleven years from now there's going to be a Starbucks right there," she pointed to a corner where a shoe repair workshop stood.

"I would kill for a coffee right now."

Molly laughed a little too nervously and couldn't help but look up at the building. The spot where Sherlock jumped didn't exist yet, well it was covered by a taller lip. When the hospital was renovated after The Blitz they left it out. She fought the urge to ask him about John but as they continued on she wondered something else.

"What did you see in the newspaper that made you upset yesterday?" Molly asked. Leave it to her to ruin a lovely time by asking something that was none of her business.

Sherlock looked at her, shock, surprise or perhaps both shining in his eyes. He turned to answer her and a scream reverberated through the streets. They were out of sight of Bart's now and the screams seemed to be coming from that direction. Before Molly had time to process what was happening Sherlock was running, pulling her along behind him. The cold stung her cheeks as they raced through the gas lamp lit streets toward the sound of the calamity.

"Christ," Molly stopped short of the scene and Sherlock pounced down onto all fours. Laying there in the snow, without a drop of blood spilled on the ground was a skeleton. Molly could tell by the shape and size it was more than likely female, younger than herself more than likely.

"What happened here?" Molly asked.

"I have no idea."

Sherlock looked up at her from the ground, he was already holding a magnifying glass, ready to scrutinize the body. _Where had he gotten that from?_

She'd given him the cake and the tickets to the lovely concert, but if she knew anything about Sherlock he would consider this her best gift of the night.

* * *

><p>Molly sat on the steps of a baker that was right across from Bart's with Sherlock's jacket draped over her shoulders as she watched him fuss over the body. (Fuss was the only accurate way to describe the way with which he was excited by this corpse) It had been a short time and he hadn't stopped muttering to himself about the lack of evidence, the cleanliness of the scene, the masterful way that the body had been stripped of skin and fluids. None of what he said let on that even he had any clue about how it happened.<p>

And he was positively ecstatic over it.

Mundane crimes were such a bother for Sherlock, he would turn down anything that felt ordinary and simple to him. Sherlock was always looking for the complicated and the difficult—and this was more than just that. This seemed impossible.

But Molly reminded herself that she'd traveled across the universe and to the past in a blue box no bigger than her shower at home—so the impossible was under review.

"Molly this is absolutely glorious. I can't see anything here to suggest who the killer was or what they used. How long would you say it was before we sprinted back here?"

"Less than a minute."

"One minute, what could do this to a person in less than a minute?"

"You think she's the one that screamed?"

"What do you think?"

"Sherlock, the more likely thing is that someone else screamed and ran away. This skeleton was arranged here but the killing and the skinning took place somewhere else," Molly said.

Sherlock looked at her as if he had never seen her before and then turned back to his work.

Molly happened to glance across the street and on either side of the entrance to Bart's she noticed something else that must have been left out after The Blitz. A hospital built in 1123 would have gone through a lot of renovations, so it's possible that they were taken out some other time. Guarding the entrance archway to the building there were two great statues of angels with their arms down at their sides and solemn, blank faces staring out across the street and right towards them.

Their posture, the architecture of their wings and the general sculpting work was familiar but Molly couldn't really place it.

A whistle rang out from up the block and the sound hooves galloping over cobblestone suddenly became apparent to Molly.

"This is a crime scene! What do you think you're doing here?"

Molly couldn't believe what she was hearing, she rose to her feet and turned to see Detective Inspector Lestrade mounted on horseback in uniform and with a tiny, little mustache just above his lip.

"Oh my God," she muttered.

Sherlock turned to look at him and couldn't help but do a double take before laughing. "I know what it is, I've done well not to disturb anything, though you may want to take my help in this matter," Sherlock said.

"How do I know you're not the one responsible for this?" asked Lestrade. By this time a few other men from the force had ridden up beside him.

Sherlock held his hands up. "There's no blood on my fingers and I'm not carrying any tools. To transport a body here and leave it I would have needed some form of transport, but these bones have barely grown cold. This woman was alive a few minutes ago—I heard her scream."

"I told you once, she had to have been dumped here," Molly said. She walked over to Lestrade and extended her hand. "Molly Holmes—my husband here and I are enthusiasts, detectives."

Molly had been waiting to call herself _Holmes_ for a very long time.

Sherlock glared at her and Lestrade climbed down from his horse to walk over to Sherlock's side. "I'm sorry, Mister and Missus Holmes, but we don't allow amateurs onto crime scenes," Lestrade hoisted Sherlock up by the shoulder but lost his grip.

When Sherlock spilled over onto the ground he grasped the femur and knocked it out of place. Molly gasped and Sherlock dropped the bone back onto the ground. "Dust," he said.

"What was that?" Lestrade asked.

"There's a thin layer of dust coating the bones," Sherlock ran his hand over the other leg, over the ribs, over the arm and the skull. "Something was grinding, gnawing at these bones, it tore through the skin and did this too…"

Molly had never seen Sherlock stumped like this before, he didn't react as Lestrade had the two of them led away and escorted back to Baker's street. He kept repeating how it didn't make any sense why the bones would be ground up, even a little. They were taken back to the door of the flat, but it took Molly to open door and guide Sherlock inside. If she didn't know any better she would have sworn it was shock.

* * *

><p>A week went by without the Doctor. Without television or radio or electricity or many of the other amenities of home. She wanted to heed the warning about not altering the future, but at the same time she wanted out of the house. All there was to do was watch Sherlock hypothesis over the origins of the skeleton. He had been convinced that it was a dangerous idea to mess with time in this manner.<p>

Molly wasn't sure if he was right, but if a real Sherlock Holmes was found to be wandering the streets of London solving crimes and then someone wrote stories about him later it might be a little bit jarring to fiction and history. She would rather not see the universe explode or whatever would happen in this case.

On the seventh day it became obvious that Sherlock couldn't contain the curiosity and the questions and that he had to know what had happened outside of Saint Bart's that day. Toby stalked the room behind Sherlock's pacing; apparently he had grown attached already. In this time the room was devoid of lab equipment and the other knickknacks that Sherlock had acquired over the years.

Something about the textured wall paper and tight, square sitting room had always made her feel somewhat at home. Of course Molly had never lived in this flat, but her own flat felt much too foreign to her—even with Toby there.

"You've got to eat," Molly told him as she sat a plate out in front of him on the small coffee table. It was dark already and the glow from the street lamps was reaching up through the windows and into the room.

"I had some of the cake," Sherlock said.

"The cakes been gone for three days."

Molly was a little on edge, she'd gone out to make groceries a few times and that was pretty much it. As cozy as this place was, without the Doctor's input and in this time she felt as if she were in a prison.

The tea kettle went off and she didn't really have any mittens to grab it with. She'd been using newspapers, there were enough of them lying around. The nearest was on the corner of the table and when she went to take it Sherlock rose up and snatched it away. "I'm reading that."

"It's from before we got here," Molly's voice trembled, his sudden movement had frightened her a little. "What is it in that paper that's so important?"

She stepped in close half tackling him to get at the paper. A week couped up in a house with Sherlock, sleeping in a bed next to Sherlock while he slept on the floor, cooking for Sherlock and only having time alone when she went to use the loo had taken its toll. Much of the power he had over her before had fizzled out. Though there were moments during the day or night when there would be something to remind her of their old lives, times when she looked at him and felt that same fluttering, light feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Somehow all the dreams of romance had slipped her mind, despite the physical contact. Sherlock pushed her back onto the table, pinning her down with the paper between them. She gazed at the print and the story nearest her face caught her eye. She'd heard the name somewhere before.

_Irene Adler._

Her efforts to struggle with Sherlock became half hearted and her eyes drooped. "You—it was that woman from morgue that night. The one who died," Molly said. "The one you knew from _more than her face_."

Sherlock stepped back, helping her up from the table, but said nothing.

"She's dead here too?"

"She wasn't dead there. It was a ruse, she faked her death," Sherlock said. "That's where I got the idea."

Molly pushed her hair back into place and concentrated on her feet, not wanting to look in his direction. "Who was she?"

"A case. A dominatrix who'd gotten hold of government secrets and was playing a dangerous game with Moriarty…"

"I mean to you. Who was she to you?"

"No one. Just a woman," Sherlock said.

Molly dropped into the seat in front of her plate. "Are there a lot of _just women_ with you?"

"What does that mean?"

"It's a question."

"You're behaving like we're really married—if you must know there are no women. And no, no men either, before you say it."

"I wasn't thinking it. I know you're not gay—apparently I've dated enough of them to tell the difference," she paused. "But there has to have been someone."

Sherlock was glaring at her now, his face seeming colder than normal. "There's no one. Dating, sex, women—they're a distraction from my work."

"Everyone dates or has sex…you're not a priest. It's not required of you to remain celibate," Molly said. "How long have you felt like this? Something has to have happened to have made you feel this way."

Sherlock was eating now and talking about something other than _those bones_. "Logic dictates that I should feel this way. When you watch someone who's in love waste their time and efforts in a trivial pursuit of lofty, unattainable happiness or when you've seen the people who run the streets from pub to pub chasing sex every night of the week you realize how much some biological functions and emotional reactions truly are a waste of time."

The last part had barely registered to Molly, she felt like the love thing was him hinting at his feelings toward her. She swallowed, unsure of if she could hold back the tears. She didn't want to be the person who cried in front of Sherlock, but sometimes he was so blind to what he did to her.

_Or he just didn't care what he did._

He stuffed another forkful of the food into his mouth. "What's the matter?" he asked.

Molly just shook her head. "There's no point in continuing the discussion," she said.

They ate in silence for the next several minutes and then Sherlock raised his head and looked directly at her and said. "I need a favor of you, Molly. You're the only person in this time I can trust," he said.

She smiled, though it was forced.

"You're going to know Saint Bart's as well as anyone and because of the state of women's rights and achievements in this time period your sneaking in could be seen as some innocent folly as opposed to a real crime. That lab where we met should still be there and there has to be a microscope, however weak, that you could steal for me."

"What are you planning?"

"We're going to solve that case," he said.

"But the Doctor said—"

Toby hopped up into Sherlock's lap. "To Hell with what he said. I went years in London doing this without amassing any recognition before I ever became famous. Word doesn't travel half as fast now—all that's required is that we keep a low profile."

Part of her wanted to believe he was right and that this was going to be an innocent little case they could solve without any of the usual complications but as she sat there and watched him stroke Toby she knew it wasn't going to be. And Molly felt little and pathetic all over again because she couldn't put her foot down, she knew this was trouble but she always knew she was going to help him.


End file.
